I thought I would share this unique story with you of how I landed my first job after graduating from UCF…

I graduated in December and had multiple offers of $30-38,000 a year: not to sound arrogant, but I am not a $30-38,000 a year candidate. I know my resume, my experience being a Brother of Alpha Kappa Psi, and I know what my degree from the UCF’s College of Business is worth.

I decided to hold out, jobless for nearly three months before I landed a unique offer and you’ll never guess how I found out about it: LinkedIn.

An old class mate of mine from my Junior year ‘liked’ a job posting and her action showed up on my wall. I was scrolling through LinkedIn one night on my iPhone while at the bar with some AKPsi Brothers (naturally) and it came up ‘Seeking Director of Business Development for Intimidate Hire’. I thought to myself: ‘The position sounds cool enough, let me check it out..’

I applied for the position that night and did multiple phone interviews, Skype interview, and finally I was paid to come up and meet the owner of the company in Atlanta. After an unconventional in person interview (we sat at a local Thai restaurant and ate green curry chicken, while discussing my portfolio) he offered me the position and I moved my life to Atlanta, GA two weeks later. I wouldn’t want to divulge what my salary and bonus structure is, but is nearly double any offers I had in FL.

My position at Select Luxury Cars as Director of Business Development has been great so far, handling lost leads, marketing, social media, car shows, etc: very fast paced and I love what I do.

My boss said I was hired because:

1) I am an Eagle Scout
2) My involvement with the College of Business and Alpha Kappa Psi
3) I was qualified, young, ambitious, and could grow with the company

I have since encouraged ALL to update their LinkedIn as I did and use it at a tool to land a job…it worked for me!”

Paul Jarley, Ph.D., is the dean of the UCF College of Business Administration. He blogs every week at http://www.bus.ucf.edu/dean. This post appeared on June 5, 2013. Follow him on Twitter @pauljarley